New Orleans 8th Annual Jewish Film Festival

The Jewish Community Center and the Shir Chadash Conservative Congregation along with Loyola University New Orleans present the 8th annual New Orleans Jewish Film Festival, February 24, 26, and 27. All films will be shown at Loyola University New Orleans in the Roussel Performance Hall in the Music/Communications Building, 6363 St. Charles Avenue. Tickets are $9, adults; $5 seniors and college students/faculty/staff. Festival passes are $20. For additional ticket information, contact Lainie at 897-0141 or e-mail lainie@nojcc.com.

Thursday, February 24, 2005

A Different War – 7:30 p.m.

Director/Writer: Nadav Gal

Israel, 2003, 15 min, Hebrew with English subtitles

Jerusalem during the Intifada: Numi, a fourth grade student from the Gilo frontier neighborhood, has been chosen to play King David in the end of the year school play. Yet deep down Numi longs to play the role of the princess instead.

Special Jury Award New York Children’s Film Festival, 2004

Paper Clips – 8 p.m., and Sunday at 1:20 p.m.

Directors: Elliot Berlin & Joe Fab

USA, 2004, 87 min, English, National Release

The town of Whitwell is a tiny community of about 2000 people nestled in the mountains of Tennessee. Its citizens are almost exclusively white and Christian. In 1998, the children of WhitwellMiddle School took on an inspiring project, launched out of their principle’s desire to help her students open their eyes to the diversity of the world beyond their insulated valley. What happened would change the students, their teachers, their families and the entire town forever, and eventually open hearts and minds around the world. Paper Clips tells the moving story of how these students responded to what had been to them a completely unfamiliar chapter in human history—the Holocaust—with a promise to honor every single soul lost in that horrible event by collecting paperclips to represent each individual murdered by the Nazis.

Special appearance by the principle of Whitwell Junior High, Linda Cooper, on Sunday.

Saturday, February 26, 2005

Korby’s Girlfriend – 7:30 p.m.

Israel, 1994, 13 min, Hebrew with English subtitles

Korby, a local punk, has a good-looking girlfriend. When Myron tries to pick her up, Korby joins up with Krotochinsky, the bully, to take revenge, just as dictated by the Ten Commandments.

Best Short of the Year: JSFS Annual Short Fims Competition, 1994

Gloomy Sunday – 8 p.m.

Director: Rolf Schubel

Germany/Hungary, 1999, 114 min, German with English subtitles

Adult Material: Nudity and Adult Themes

Set in pre-WWII Budapest, this magnificent German film, winner of numerous awards here and abroad, fills the screen with rich textures, indelible characters and a song that has haunted listeners for over half a century. First and foremost this is a love story, a ménage a trois that gets more complicated as time passes. It is an eloquent story of war

and its aftermath right up to a stunning twist at the end.

Sunday, February 27, 2005

A Good Uplift – 1 p.m.

Director Faye Lederman

USA, 2003, 13 min, English

A delightfully lighthearted peek into a tiny but famous lower East Side New York lingerie shop, where owner and Jewish grandmother Magdo Bernstein does her best to embrace her clientele, supporting women of all shapes and sizes in their quest for the perfect bra.

Purim – 4 p.m.

Director: Lavi Ben Gal & Udi Caspi

Israel, 2004, 80 min, Hebrew with English subtitles

A young Arab who doesn’t want to die is sent to carry out a suicide bombing in the heart of Tel Aviv, but can’t find the place where he is supposed to blow himself up. Against the background of preparations for the Purim carnival and the alert of possible terror attacks, several stories are interwoven into a human mosaic where the viewer is introduced to a diverse group of people who are about to come together through the tragedy of a terrorist attack. The senseless atmosphere that binds the story reflects the victims who are chosen randomly to suffer.